Phases of 2020

In my planning, this year is broken up into phases. Periods of time when all my focus bends towards a particular milestone, then pivots to spin off in a new direction once radically new focus is needed.

For instance, the first stages of the year were all about preparing for my Thesis Review meeting, where I sit down with supervisors and review where I’m up to after three years of research, then determine whether I’m likely to finish my doctorate in a timely manner.

It’s a phase that’s required a *lot* of dedicated work on my exegetical writing, which meant my focus hasn’t been on fiction for nearly three months now. Also a phase where I ticked boxes I’d left unticked through 2019, such as delivering a hastily conceived public presentation of my research (archived here, in all it’s flawed glory) and structuring the meta-data that goes along with the thesis.

One of my supervisors suggested my exegesis could be finished with a good, solid week of shaping and edits. I have my doubts about that, but holy god, given my history with not-writing-exegetical-work, the fact that I’m this close is damn near miraculous.

It also means that I move into the next major phase of 2020, pivoting away from exegetical writing and towards getting all the fiction for my PhD project written. That’s the next three months, after which I move into finish-all-the-edits-and-busy-work-before-my-scholarship-runs-out until the ed of July, upon which I pivot into an oh-crap, I-need-an-income-source-to-replace-my-scholarship scramble to find a new dayjob that will cover the mortgage.

And, of course, underpinning all of that is the ongoing work to build up Brain Jar Press: putting out new books, re-releasing older work, and generally building up a readership. This, too, has its phases–last week I transitioned from “figuring out production” to “figuring out promotion.” A chunk of budget I invested in courses and eduction last year is now swung towards tools like Facebook Ads, putting eyeballs on first-in-series books like Exile and building up a readership.

All in all, it’s the kind of abrupt transitions that makes me think long and hard about establishing a Doing Now page here on the sight, just so it’s easy for folks to get an overview of where I’m at.